1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to configuration of communications systems and, more particularly, to configuration of telephone systems.
2. Related Art
Modern telephone systems provide a wealth of features far beyond those available in the networks of standalone rotary-dial telephones of yesterday. Even relatively simple and inexpensive telephones for use in homes provide the ability to store telephone numbers and then retrieve and dial them at the touch of a button (“speed dialing”), view previously-dialed telephone numbers and the telephone numbers of previously-received calls, and store telephone messages in multiple voice mailboxes. Businesses that use Private Branch Exchanges (PBXs) are able to provide their users with even more sophisticated features, such as the ability to participate in conference calls, forward messages to other users, and transfer incoming calls directly to voicemail or to an external telephone number (such as that associated with a cell phone).
As is the case with all sophisticated technological systems, such telephone systems require some initial configuration and are capable of being customized by their users. A particular user's telephone, for example, may need to be initially programmed with the user's name, a voicemail greeting, and the user's account privileges (such as whether the user is allowed to place international calls). The user may then perform further customization, such as storing individual telephone numbers for quick recall using the speed dial function and setting the system to transfer all incoming calls directly to voicemail.
Such initialization and customization processes can be tedious, time-consuming, and prone to error. To store a new telephone number as a speed dial number, for example, the user must first recognize that he calls a particular telephone number frequently, learn how to store such a number as a speed dial number, and then actually store the number in a free speed dial slot. Because the telephone numbers that a particular user dials frequently may change over time (such as when the user completes a project with a particular team and begins a project with a new team), this procedure may require the user to repeatedly identify new frequently-used telephone numbers and store them as speed dial numbers. The procedure for storing a speed dial number may involve performing a specific sequence of tasks that is difficult to remember and susceptible to being performed incorrectly, such as: (1) hitting a “speed dial” key; (2) entering the telephone number to store; (3) entering a number (e.g., 0-9) of an empty speed dial slot; and (4) hitting a key, such as the “#” key, to indicate that the procedure is complete. Such procedures can be particularly difficult for users to remember and perform correctly because they often vary from telephone system to telephone system. This is merely one example of the ways in which configuring conventional telephone systems can be tedious, time-consuming, and prone to error.
What is needed, therefore, are improved techniques for configuring telephony systems.